Stuff I Like: Koh-i-noor Woodless Pencils

Welcome to another Sunday edition of Stuff I Like. You can find all ‘Stuff I Like’ posts {here}. This week: Koh-i-noor Woodless Pencils – they are amazing!! First the disclaimer:

**These are not products that I was asked to endorse in any way. While they might be things that are carried by companies I do design work for – they are just things that I love and want to share the benefits of with all of you. So please rest assured that I am absolutely honestly in love with these products. I do not rave about anything I do not use every day myself, ok?**

Koh-i-noor Woodless Pencils

I’m sure you have probably noticed that I use these a lot now. They are really fabulous! Very smooth, rich texture and they blend like a dream. I had prismacolor pencils before – these are heads above as far as blend-ability and color. They have a richer color in the end than prismas do. My only complaint is that I wish there were more colors available! They are also quite inexpensive as far as coloring paraphernalia goes. Usually they run about $16 – not too bad!

To use these, you need Odorless Mineral Spirits (although I’ve heard some people use baby oil with them – I’ve not tried that so I do not know) and something to blend them. I use blending stumps. I prefer {these} as they come in 3 different sizes so you have options when it comes to coloring a large or small area. I also had someone recommend using one end for each color family (like one end for reds/oranges, one end for greens, one end for blues, etc). I began doing this and it helped so much! No more sanding ALL the time and no more repeated wiping of the stump to get the color off. It will also make your stumps last for a loooong time!

Now, to show you how these look – I did a little comparison. All using the same cardstock, the same image, and the same ink. (I use palette noir with mine. I also prefer Papertrey white cardstock with them as well.)

The first was done with SU reinkers and a niji waterbrush. This has long been my preferred method. My tutorial on this is {here}.

The second was done using SU markers and a niji waterbrush. This is a new technique I saw on Cambria’s blog. You can find more info {here}. (My tip for this technique is to not try with a detailed image like this one. It seemed to work better on a bit larger image – I’ll show another try at it later this week.)

The third was done using the koh-i-noor woodless pencils, OMS and blending stumps.

Now – can you see how much more the color pops with the koh-i-noor pencils? I do like the watercolored look of the reinkers as well, but wow – the koh-i-noors are so vibrant! (All of these were done on SU watercolor paper – as the marker technique has to be done on wc paper.)